A Song for Ella Grey

by David Almond

  And beneath the tales there was just silence. And maybe the true truth was what many said—Orpheus had drowned, he’d slit his wrists, he’d overdosed, Orpheus was dead.

  Everything was silent in the winter. We all worked worked worked, preparing for next year’s exams. We read our texts and read them again and tried to commit them to our hearts. Those of us who had loved her kept a photograph of smiling Ella in our books. She bookmarked my texts, my notes, my scribblings. She walked through my thoughts, waded through my dreams. Sometimes I woke in the dead of night and heard wet footsteps in the street outside and heard her calling, Claire! It’s me. They let me out again! I heard her coming up my stairs, rattling my door. Open up! Let me out!

  Sometimes I dared to open the door, to discover nothing but the steep dark stairwell with the fading echo of her voice in it.

  Snow fell, and deepened, deepened. Temperatures plummeted. Minus 10, minus 15, even here in the city. I thought of Orpheus in such a winter. How would he cope? But he must have always coped. These days I couldn’t walk anywhere without imagining the world below. The solid ground was built on nothingness. Every crack was the chink below which the great gulf lay. Every opening was an entrance to the chasms of eternity.

  Icicles hung on the Ouseburn gates. Ice thickened on the bars and locks and feathered the edges of the stream. Beyond the gates, in the frosted gloom, the fleeting shapes of familiar demons shifted.

  We still gathered at The Cluny. We sat in our circle wrapped in scarves, close together to share our heat. We talked of Italy, Greece, of what we’d do when spring and summer came again. But where was there to go when Northumberland held the memories of such pain? We talked of places further to the South—Yorkshire, Sussex, Cornwall—but we felt no passion for them. Strange. The beauties of the North seemed to be intensified by the loss we had experienced there, and they drew us back to them. We’d go again, we said. We’d celebrate our lost friend’s life there. And maybe he’ll come back again was what many thought and none dared whisper.

  Bianca stopped me in the corridor one day.

  “Nae word?” she said.

  “Of what?”

  “Of him, of course. Of bliddy Orpheus.”

  I shrugged. I told her no.

  “He’ll be back,” she said.

  “Aye,” said Crystal Carr, coming up behind her. “That one’s too damn fit to just gan dark.”

  “He’s brokenhearted,” I said.

  “He’s a lad,” said Crystal.

  “And she was just a lass,” said Bianca.

  “He’ll get over it.”

  “Be back to his senses soon enough.”

  “And then he’ll need a damn good seein’ to.”

  They giggled, leered.

  “He knaas what’s on offer here.”

  “Bliddy right. He can tek the two of us.”

  “Ding dong.”

  “Ding dang dong.”

  “Ding dang diddly diddly ding dang dong.”

  The year turned. The Northern dark relented. We dared to hope for spring. It came slowly, slowly.

  Then James came to my side one Monday morning.

  “I think I saw him,” he said.

  “Him?”

  “Orpheus.”

  “When?”

  “Yesterday.”

  “It was really him?”

  “I’m sure it was.”

  “Where?”

  “I was at Craster. With Paul.”

  “Paul?”

  He blushed.

  “My friend,” he said. “It was so lovely. Still freezing but the air was like crystal. The sea was bright blue. We were walking on the track to Dunstanburgh, between the beach and the dunes. You know it?”

  Yes, I knew. Another lovely northern place, another place to sing about, another place for words and tales. Yellow sand and black cormorants on black rocks and the jagged ruins of the castle on the headland.

  “I couldn’t believe it,” James went on. “Him. The hair, the coat, the lyre. That’s him, I said to Paul. ‘Who?’ he said. Orpheus, I told him. He’s sitting on the beach, some other guys with him. Paul wanted to meet him, of course.”

  “And you did, too?”

  “Yes. So we went down to the sand. The other guys are sitting and standing in a sort of ring around him. I think he’s got the lyre in his hands but he’s not playing it.”

  “Just guys, no girls?”

  “No girls. They turn round as we step down onto the beach. They bunch up, and you can see they don’t want us there. Orpheus turns and sees us. I speak his name: Orpheus. Doesn’t seem to recognize me. ‘I’m James,’ I say. One of the blokes comes close and tells us to shove off. ‘Orpheus,’ I say again. ‘I knew Ella. I was there the day…’ He looks at me and I’m sure he remembers, but he turns his head away towards the sea. The bloke stands right in front of me. ‘Clear off back to where you come from,’ he says. ‘But I know him,’ I say. ‘No you don’t,’ says the bloke. ‘You know nothing.’ Paul comes to my side. ‘I said shove off,’ says the bloke. Then another one’s there. I say we don’t want any trouble. I call to Orpheus. I ask him is he OK. He looks again, but he doesn’t respond. ‘See,’ says the bloke. ‘He doesn’t know you. He doesn’t want to know you. He wants you gone.’ I don’t know what to do. Some of the blokes look hard as nails: leathers and boots and like they’re just waiting for an excuse to start on us. Or maybe they were just protecting him. ‘Come on,’ says Paul. So we leave. I keep turning back. Orpheus doesn’t. We walk on to Dunstanburgh. I try to tell Paul what it used to be like, what his music was like, but there’s no way I can tell him, really. When we come back again, Orpheus and his mates are gone. Just the tracks of them leading from the sand onto the grass and no sign of them anywhere.”

  “It was really him?”

  “It was. I’m certain. It must have been…”

  “It wasn’t cause you wanted it to be him?”

  “No. No.”

  “He looked OK?”

  “Same as he always looked.”

  “Gorgeous?”

  “Gorgeous, like always. And like he nearly wasn’t there, like he didn’t really want to be there, like always.”

  • • •

  Sam learned to drive that spring. His parents allowed him to borrow their car. He took me on little jaunts up into the Durham hills, and down to South Shields. Sometimes he pulled up in obscure laybys and we made a clumsy kind of love. He became more confident and one Sunday morning he drove us northwards, across the Tyne, across the coalfields, towards the beaches.

  “This is the life,” he said, putting his foot down, speeding towards the sea. “Footloose and free,” he said. “The world’s our bliddy oyster.”

  He knew I wasn’t with him. I made him take me to Craster, to Dunstanburgh, to the road alongside the dunes at Bamburgh. I told him to take me across the causeway to Holy Island. He saw me peering into the world to catch a sight of what we’d lost. Once or twice I saw what I thought was him and called out, “There, Sam! There!” but it was not him.

  “Stop it, Claire,” Sam said.

  “Eh?”

  “He’s gone, just like she has. And even if he hasn’t he wouldn’t want you.”

  I said nothing. A herd of startled cattle ran through a nearby field.

  “All he wants these days is lads. Lads like James, that’s what the story is.”

  “Is it, now?”

  “Aye, it is. That’s the way he’s gone.”

  He glared at me, then accelerated suddenly.

  “I’ll take you bliddy home,” he said.

  He drove too fast for the twisting roads leading back towards the A1. At Howick he braked suddenly as a pheasant dawdled in front of us. The car lurched into the roadside hedge. He pressed his face to the steering wheel.

  “Go to hell, Claire,” he said.

  I waited. Thorns and broken twigs and foliage pressed against my window. He went on cursing me, then backed the car out of the hedge. He didn�
��t dare look at the bodywork damage, drove the car carefully away.

  There were tears in his eyes. We drove in silence. We got onto the A1 and headed south.

  “It’s hopeless, isn’t it?” he said.

  “You care nowt for me, do you?” he said.

  “Oh, Sam,” I whispered. “Of course I do.”

  “You think I’m just a fool.”

  “I don’t.”

  “What’s wrong with me, then?”

  No answer.

  We headed homeward.

  “Mebbe you should find another Ella,” he said, “and not bother with bliddy lads at all.”

  Long silence, from both of us.

  “Aye,” he said. “Mebbe that’s the way it should all turn out.”

  How do stories spread? How fester? How get such momentum? People take the words and spin them. They play with them, polish them, recreate, intensify them, cast them on. The tales flow like water, take new currents, eddies, whirlpools, swirls. They find new routes, flow over new beds, cut new gullies, draw on different sources.

  “Gone gay?” said Carlo in the schoolyard one day. “Where’s the surprise in that? He was always bliddy gay.”

  Others rushed into the conversation.

  “Always.”

  “Right from the start.”

  “So bliddy obvious.”

  “That coat.”

  “That lyre.”

  “That bliddy voice.”

  “Aye, that voice.”

  “And the way he stood there singing.”

  “Oooh, I’m Orpheus.”

  “Hmmmm. I’m bliddy gorgeous.”

  “Lalalala just look at me.”

  “Bliddy Jessie.”

  Crystal Carr, hands on hips, head tilted. “Bliddy teaser.”

  “Hahahaha!”

  Bianca, pulling her top down. “Must’ve been gay not to notice this.”

  Giggles. Giggles.

  “Teaser.”

  “Ha!”

  So the mocking song got into the air and into the songs of the birds and the blowing of the wind and the flowing of the water. There was much laughter, many jokes. But they were laced with venom. And the laughter grew in hate.

  Teaser. Poser. Trickster. Fooled us all. Fooled poor lost Ella.

  “Aye, especially Ella Grey.”

  “Aye, specially that poor lass.”

  “And he knew what he was doin’.”

  “Course he did.”

  “Dead right.”

  “Bliddy charmer.”

  “Bet it’s not the first time.”

  “Bet it’s bliddy not.”

  “Bet there’s been tons of bliddy Ella Greys.”

  “Ella after Ella.”

  “And there’ll be tons more if he’s not stopped.”

  “Teaser.”

  “Killer.”

  “Aye, bliddy killer.”

  “Aye, if he’d not turned up she’d be with us still.”

  “Killer.”

  “Murderer.”

  “He’ll get what’s comin’.”

  “We’ll find a way to find him.”

  “He’ll get his bliddy dues.”

  Such venom, such contempt. It seemed out of kilter. Yes, he brought trouble, but he also brought joy, he brought love. There had been nothing like his music in our world before. But all was turning like the tide, like the relentless earth. Admiration turned to scorn. Astonishment to disbelief. Laughter to savagery. Love to hate. And they turned as if they were destined to turn, as if the song of praise that had sung through Orpheus was bound to become a song of hate that sang through them and drove them on. Soon they were talking of searching for him, hunting for him, punishing him.

  “We’ll give him his comeuppance,” they snarled.

  “We’ll make him pay.”

  • • •

  Spring quickened, strengthened. Unfurling leaves, first blossom, bright yellow daffodils trumpeting above the grass. Exams loomed. We worked harder, harder. All of us were under pressure. Why must we work so hard when the sun blazed through the classroom window and the world was telling us to play? Krakatoa growled, grumbled, urged us on. It would all be for the best, he said. Discipline now would earn us years of freedom later. Don’t be distracted. Keep your eyes on the prize.

  He erupted one afternoon in late March when Bianca shoved her books aside and groaned.

  “Yes, Miss Finch?”

  “It is all so bliddy boring.”

  “Continue.”

  “It is all so bliddy ancient.”

  He stood in the aisle among us. He seethed.

  “Paradise Lost!” Bianca went on. “Let’s all go abliddy Maying, and my ending is despair and blablablablablablabla. We’ve got our lives to live. We’re young!”

  “Infantile is perhaps a better word.”

  “Sod off!” she snarled at him. “Decrepit is the word for you. Knackered is the word. Worn out! Useless! Bliddy ancient! Look at you, old man!” She stood up. She glared at all of us. “Look at all of you! Old before you let yourselves be bliddy young!”

  “Get out,” said Krakatoa.

  She didn’t move. She grinned.

  “Get out, you…”

  “Say it,” she sneered. “You’ve been dying to say it all these months…”

  “You stupid child. You little tart. You…”

  She grinned.

  “Oh, sir!” she simpered.

  “Get out!” he yelled.

  She coolly lifted her bag from the back of her chair.

  She puckered her lips at him.

  “Don’t do that!” he snapped.

  “Do what, sir?” she asked.

  She tilted her head, smoothed her shirt over her breasts.

  “Get out!”

  He stepped closer to her. His eyes bulged. His face was purple. His fists were clenched.

  “Oh, sir!” she said. She widened her eyes, licked her lips. “What are you going to do, sir?”

  He slumped, he groaned.

  “Go back,” he muttered.

  “Back where?”

  “To whatever slime you slithered from, you slut…”

  “Oh! What drives you to such language, sir?”

  She licked her lips. She blew a kiss at him.

  “Goodbye, old man,” she said. “Goodbye to all of you. And go to hell, each and every one of you.”

  She went out the door. Crystal jumped from her chair and followed her.

  Krakatoa closed the door.

  “Continue with your work,” he muttered.

  “Forgive me,” he whispered.

  “That was not me,” he said.

  “Oh, ye Gods,” he sighed.

  We watched the two girls cross the yard just as we had watched Ella all those months ago. They swaggered arm-in-arm into the shimmering emptiness at the edge of the schoolyard.

  They didn’t turn.

  They went beyond our sight towards the story’s end.

  TWO

  This is what she came back with, Bianca, just two weeks later. It was night. There’d been some kind of power cut. I was reading. I was taking time off from revising, trying to move past all the ancient stuff. I shone my torch down onto The World’s Wife, but could make no sense of anything. I looked out. Great swathes of Tyneside were in deepest black beneath the glittering stars. Dogs were howling. Someone somewhere was screaming: a crazy game or murder, no way to know.

  Mum called my name from downstairs.

  “Someone to see you!” she called.

  I went down and found Bianca standing in the kitchen, in the firelight and candlelight. Skin gleaming, hair awry, dark stains on her clothes, little rucksack on her back. Bianca, all subdued, tattoo on her neck, so out of place among the Le Creuset pots and the prints, like somebody from a different world.

  “It’s Bianca,” said Mum, stupidly.

  She widened her eyes at me as she said it.

  “She says she’s a friend of yours,” she said.

 
“She is.”

  “From school?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  I touched Bianca’s arm.

  “Can I get you anything?” I said.

  She shook her head.

  “No.”

  “Come on upstairs,” I told her.

  We went up. I told her to sit on the bed. I asked her nothing. We sat in silence for a long time. Maybe I knew the kind of thing that was on its way.

  At last she spread her hands before her, rubbed at the stains on them.

  “It’s blood,” she whispered.

  “Still there,” she whispered.

  She sighed. She reached down into her rucksack and took out a little bottle of vodka. Held it out to me. I shook my head. She unscrewed the cap and swigged.

  “I think I loved him,” she said.

  “Him?”

  “Orpheus.”

  “But the things you’ve said about him. The things…”

  “I always did. Right from the start. Right from seeing him in the yard that day. And seeing him on the beach. And hearing him. I was…lost in him.”

  “I thought you hated him.”

  “Thought I’d never get near him. Not with Ella around, then with you around.”

  “Me?”

  “Yes, Claire. You. Why would he want a thing like me when he could have a girl like you?”

  She swigged again.

  “He was so beautiful,” she whispered. “Wasn’t he?”

  “Yes.”

  “And the things he made you hear. And the things he made you feel.”

  “Yes, I know.”

  She screwed the cap back onto the bottle.

  “I’ve been very drunk,” she said. “But what I saw is true.”

  I waited again.

  “It was love,” she said. “Even if I didn’t understand it myself till now. You don’t go searching for somebody out of hate.”

  “You searched for him?”

  “Yes. Just like I did on his wedding day. Leave home, travel North, find the bugger, flaunt yourself, offer yourself. I would’ve done anything. Anything.”

  She looked at me, as if she were a child, come here to be comforted.

  “Oh hell, Claire,” she said.

  Her tears started to fall. I reached out to touch her. I went to the bed and sat with her and put my arm around her. She wept for a while.

  “Oh, I’m so sorry,” she said. “There was nothing I could do.”